The Commentariat -- November 25, 2019
Afternoon Update:
Helene Cooper & Thomas Gibbons-Neff of the New York Times: "President Trump ordered the Pentagon not to remove a Navy SEAL at the center of a high-profile war crimes case from the elite commando unit, Defense Secretary Mark T. Esper said Monday. Mr. Esper's confirmation of the order from Mr. Trump is the latest turn in an extraordinary series of events that pitted the president against his senior military leadership over the fate of Chief Petty Officer Edward Gallagher, the SEAL who was convicted of posing for photographs with the body of a teenage Islamic State captive in American custody." The AP story is here. ~~~
~~~ John Bowden of the Hill: "President Trump announced Sunday that Kenneth Braithwaite, the current ambassador to Norway, would replace Richard Spencer as the secretary of the Navy shortly after Spencer's ouster earlier in the day.... '... Admiral and now Ambassador to Norway Ken Braithwaite will be nominated by me to be the new Secretary of the Navy. A man of great achievement and success, I know Ken will do an outstanding job!' [Trump tweeted.] Mrs. McC: Did Braithwaite take the Trump loyalty oath?
Laura Kelly of the Hill: "President Trump asked multiple federal agencies to address Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan's 'concerns' that Turkey's state-owned bank would be under threat of U.S. sanctions, according to a response from the Treasury Department to a senior Democratic senator [Ron Wyden (Oregon)].... The response by Treasury confirms an earlier report by Bloomberg that in April Trump directed Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and Attorney General William Barr to intervene in the case against Halkbank following a phone call between the two world leaders.... It is the first public U.S. admission of Trump directing Cabinet officials, in this case in Treasury and the Department of Justice, to involve themselves with Erdoğan's concerns around Halkbank, a Turkish state-owned bank indicted last month by federal prosecutors for allegedly funneling billions of dollars to Iran in violation of U.S. sanctions. It also raises questions about how Trump's personal relationships and business dealings influence his foreign policy decisions...."
"The Chosen One." William Cummings of USA Today: "Energy Secretary Rick Perry said in an interview that he told ... Donald Trump that he was God's 'chosen one' to lead the United States, just as he chose the kings to lead Israel in the Old Testament.... 'Barack Obama didn't get to be the president of the United States without being ordained by God. Neither did Donald Trump,' he said in a Fox News interview that aired Sunday, adding that God has used 'individuals who aren't perfect all through history.'" Mrs. McC: My, my, the Lord moves in mysterious ways.
Dennis Jett in the Atlantic: "As the rich get richer, the ambassadors get worse.... As the cost of American presidential campaigns skyrockets, as wealthy Americans flex their muscles within the American political system, and as the selling of ambassadorships for cold, hard cash becomes more and more overt.... No other developed democratic country -- and perhaps no other country in the world -- would entrust any part of its foreign policy to someone like Gordon Sondland.... Sondland is an egregious case, but Trump's predecessors made similar appointments for similar reasons. The three-week 'charm school' that new ambassadors attend is not enough to turn donors into diplomats. Four ambassadors appointed by Barack Obama performed so badly that, once the State Department inspector general issued reports on how poorly their embassies were run, they all resigned immediately."
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Mrs. McCrabbie: I added some links fairly late this morning. Biggest one is the NYT story, by Jo Becker & others, on the Three Stooges' attempts to get help from a couple of Ukrainian oligarchs.
Ashley Parker & Dan Lamothe of the New York Times: "Defense Secretary Mark T. Esper asked for the resignation of Navy Secretary Richard V. Spencer on Sunday after losing confidence in him over his handling of the case of a Navy SEAL accused of war crimes in Iraq, the Pentagon said. Spencer's resignation came in the wake of the controversial case of Chief Petty Officer Edward Gallagher, a Navy SEAL who was accused of war crimes on a 2017 deployment. He was acquitted of murder but convicted in July of posing with the corpse of a captive. Esper asked for Spencer's resignation after learning that he had privately proposed to White House officials that if they did not interfere with proceedings against Gallagher, then Spencer would ensure that Gallagher was able to retire as a Navy SEAL, with his Trident insignia. Spencer's private proposal to the White House -- which he did not share with Esper over the course of several conversations about the matter -- contradicted his public position on the Gallagher case, chief Pentagon spokesman Jonathan Hoffman said in a statement." (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~
~~~ Helene Cooper, et al., of the New York Times: "But Mr. Spencer had also provoked Mr. Trump's ire by threatening to resign over the case and by publicly saying he disagreed with the president's decision to intervene in favor of the commando, Chief Petty Officer Edward Gallagher, Defense Department officials said. Mr. Spencer's friends cited those reasons for his departure, saying that Mr. Esper was mischaracterizing the situation." An Axios report is here. ~~~
~~~ Mrs. McCrabbie: Everyone Donald Trump touches loses his soul -- if s/he had one. ~~~
~~~ Here's Spencer's resignation letter, where he tries to reclaim some of his (soul, that is). "Rule of law" is mentioned. Thanks to Ken W. for the link. ~~~
~~~ David Ignatius of the Washington Post: "President Trump's attempt to manipulate military justice had a sorry outcome Sunday with the firing of Navy Secretary Richard V. Spencer. For the past nine months, Spencer had tried to dissuade Trump from dictating special treatment for Navy SEAL Edward Gallagher -- but in the end Spencer was sacked for his efforts to protect his service. With Spencer's firing, Trump has recklessly crossed a line he had generally observed before, which had exempted the military from his belligerent, government-by-tweet interference. But the Gallagher case illustrates how an irascible, vengeful commander in chief is ready to override traditional limits to aid political allies in foreign policy, law enforcement and now military matters.... 'The president wants you to go,' [Defense Secretary Mark] Esper told Spencer on Sunday, according to [a] source. Esper then toed the White House line and announced Spencer's dismissal. For Pentagon officials who have wondered whether Esper would have the backbone to resist Trump, Sunday's events were troubling. The Pentagon, like the State Department under Mike Pompeo, is now overseen by an official whose overriding priority seems to be accommodating an impetuous boss in the White House."
He may be bribed by a greater interest to betray his trust, and no one would say that we ought to expose ourselves to the danger of seeing the first Magistrate in foreign pay, without being able to guard against it by displacing him. This Magistrate is not the King but the prime minister. The people are the King. -- Founder Gouverneur Morris, 1787, on the need for an impeachment provision in the U.S. Constitution ~~~
~~~ New York Times Editors: "Americans agree to give their elected officials power over them, and those officials agree to exercise that power on Americans' behalf. If the nation's leaders breach that deal by lining their own pockets and bartering the interests of their citizens, they break the trust that self-government and democracy depend on. The testimony so far indicates that it's even worse in this case. It suggests that Mr. Trump wasn't simply soliciting a bribe, but doing s to try to rig the next election. It should go without saying that representative democracy cannot work if its leaders are cheating to keep themselves in power. The argument that there's nothing to worry about because Mr. Trump's Ukraine scheme didn't work in the end misses the point. If Mr. Trump is allowed to get away with this blatant attempt at subverting the will of the 2020 voters, what's to stop him from trying again?"
... a big scandal may break out, and not only in Ukraine, but in the United States. That is, it may turn out to be a clear conspiracy against Biden. -- Ukrainian oligarch Igor Kolomoisky, ca. April 2019 ~~~
~~~ ** Jo Becker, et al., of the New York Times: How Rudy, Lev & Igor tried to cajole two Ukrainian oligarchs to dig up dirt on Joe Biden, using assistance from Donald Trump & Bill Barr as the quo to their quid. It worked with Dmitry Firtash, who is under investigation by the FBI & is fighting extradition to the U.S., but not with Igor Kolomoisky, whose U.S. legal problems are less dire & who threw Lev & Igor out of his office when they approached him to make a deal. More on the Three Stooges linked below, but this is Da Bomb. The cast of characters is by now familiar but the extent to which our American cousins went to muscle Ukrainians is not. (In fairness, the sources of the story have plenty of reason to make themselves appear more innocent & the Three Stooges more guilty, but one would be forgiven for trusting even foreign oligarchs over Trump's mob. Besides, in the case of Firtash, Barr did the quo.) Law & Crime has a summary of the report. Mrs. McC: My only question, do the Stooges wear zoot suits & fedoras to these meetings? ~~~
~~~ Travis Gettys of the Raw Story: "... Donald Trump's personal attorney considered representing a state-owned Ukrainian bank this summer while leading an apparent extortion scheme against the foreign country. Rudy Giuliani confirmed that he held discussions with Privatbank about assisting in a civil suit to recover assets linked to a former owner with ties to Ukraine's president, reported Bloomberg News.... Ukraine's previous administration nationalized Privatbank in 2016 and accused previous owner Igor Kolomoisky and his co-founder of stealing billions of dollars." Mrs. McC: Sooner or later, the FBI has to nab Giuliani for his Ukraine schemes. He was not only trying to extort Ukrainians to help Trump; at the same time, he was trying to drum up business for himself.
In case you were wondering, "Whatever does the White House have to hide?" here's a teensy taste: ~~~
~~~ ** Josh Dawsey, et al., of the Washington Post: "A confidential White House review of President Trump's decision to place a hold on military aid to Ukraine has turned up hundreds of documents that reveal extensive efforts to generate an after-the-fact justification for the decision and a debate over whether the delay was legal according to three people familiar with the records. The research by the White House Counsel's Office, which was triggered by a congressional impeachment inquiry announced in September, includes early August email exchanges between acting chief of staff Mick Mulvaney and White House budget officials seeking to provide an explanation for withholding the funds after President Trump had already ordered a hold in mid-July... One person briefed on the records examination said White House lawyers are expressing concern that the review has turned up some unflattering exchanges and facts that could at a minimum embarrass the president.... Mulvaney's request for information came days after the White House Counsel's Office was put on notice that an anonymous CIA official had made a complaint to the agency's general counsel about Trump's July 25 call to [Ukraine President] Zelensky...." (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~
~~~ Mrs. Bea McCrabbie: The White House woodwork is chock full of creepy critters, and they keep crawling out.
Rebecca O'Brien & Christopher O'Brien of Market Watch: "Two associates of Rudy Giuliani tried to recruit a top Ukrainian energy official in March in a proposed takeover of the state oil-and-gas company, describing the company's chief executive and the then-U.S. Ambassador Marie Yovanovitch as part of 'this Soros cartel' working against President Trump. 'You're a Republican, right?' Andrew Favorov, the head of natural gas for state-run Naftogaz, recalled the men, Lev Parnas and Igor Fruman, asking him, after their reference to investor and Democratic donor George Soros. 'We want you to be our guy.' Favorov said he met voluntarily this week with New York federal prosecutors as part of an investigation into the activities of Fruman, Parnas and Giuliani...." ~~~
~~~ Lev Kept the Receipts. Katherine Faulders, et al., of ABC News: "The House Intelligence Committee is in possession of audio and video recordings and photographs provided to the committee by Lev Parnas, an associate of ... Rudy Giuliani, who reportedly played a key role in assisting him in his efforts to investigate former Vice President Joe Biden and Ukraine, multiple sources familiar with the matter tell ABC News. The material submitted to the committee includes audio, video and photos that include Giuliani and Trump. It was unclear what the content depicts and the committees only began accessing the material last week. 'We have subpoenaed Mr. Parnas and [Igor] Fruman for their records. We would like them to fully comply with those subpoenas,' House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff told CNN Sunday, with a committee spokesperson adding they would not elaborate beyond the chairman's comments." ~~~
~~~ Devin Nunes, Junior Spy, Ctd. Tareq Haddad of Newsweek: "Rep. Devin Nunes, the ranking Republican member on the House Intelligence Committee, spent nearly $57,000 on a trip to Europe for him and his staff to allegedly investigate former Vice President Joe Biden, records show. The figures seem to confirm allegations made by Lev Parnas -- a Ukrainian-born American who worked as a 'fixer' for Rudy Giuliani before being indicted on criminal charges -- who said that he helped Nunes arrange meetings with various Ukrainian officials to dig up dirt on Biden. Parnas said he met Nunes in a secretive trip to Vienna, Austria, between November and December 2018, and put him in touch with former Ukrainian Prosecutor General Victor Shokin -- the lawyer who was ousted from his position in 2016 after pressure from Western leaders, including Biden, who said he was not doing enough to combat corruption." ~~~
~~~ Devin Has Another Cow. Elise Viebeck & Felicia Sonmez of the Washington Post: Devin Nunes, "the top Republican on the House Intelligence Committee, said reports that he met with ex-Ukrainian prosecutor general Viktor Shokin in Vienna last year were false, but declined to elaborate in an interview on Fox News." Mrs. McC: Of course he denied it. A junior spy knows not to blow his cover. ~~~
~~~ Christina Wilkie of CNBC: "The lawyer for an indicted business associate of Rudy Giuliani said his client is prepared to testify under oath that aides to Rep. Devin Nunes, the top Republican on the House Intelligence Committee, scrapped a trip to Ukraine this year when they realized it would mean notifying Democratic Chairman Rep. Adam Schiff. Lev Parnas would tell Congress that the purpose of the planned trip was to interview two Ukrainian prosecutors who claim to have evidence that could help ... Donald Trump's reelection campaign, Parnas' attorney, Joseph Bondy, told CNBC. But when Nunes' staff realized that going to Ukraine themselves would mean alerting Schiff to their plans, they instead asked Parnas to set up the meetings for them over phone and Skype, which he did, according to Bondy." ~~~
~~~ Mrs. McCrabbie: This is very much like Devin's midnight run to the White House, but now he's an international junior spy! From "A Night at the White House" to "A Night in Vienna" and "A Midnight Call to Kiev."
Chandelis Duster & Kristen Holmes of CNN: "House Intelligence Chairman Adam Schiff left the door open to the possibility of more hearings or depositions in the impeachment inquiry but said that Democrats will not 'wait months and months while the administration plays a game of rope-a-dope in an effort to try to stall.' Schiff indicated on Sunday in an interview with Jake Tapper on CNN's "State of the Union" that Democrats would not be taking former national security adviser John Bolton to court for his testimony. Schiff also said Bolton should have the 'courage' to testify like former National Security Council Russia expert Fiona Hill and others. And if he chooses not to testify, Bolton will have to explain to the country 'why did he wait to tell' his story in his upcoming book rather than to the public 'when it mattered.'" (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~
~~~ Justin Baragona of the Daily Beast: "House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff (D-CA) said on Sunday that one reason the whistleblower at the heart of the impeachment inquiry hasn't been called by the House to testify is that ... Donald Trump called the person a spy and threatened the whistleblower with the 'death penalty.'... 'We had a deep interest in having [him] testify,' Schiff told [Chuck] Todd [on 'Meet the Press']. 'Two things happened. One we were able to prove it with witnesses that had first-hand information and second the president and his allies effectively put that whistleblower's life in danger. The president said the whistleblower and others should be treated as a traitor and a spy and we ought to use the penalty and that's the death penalty.'..."
Sarah Kendzior of The Globe & Mail: "Ms. [Fiona] Hill is no longer merely a scholar of dictators; she is now a player in their propaganda through no fault of her own.... In Mr. Trump's reality TV world, positions are not filled but cast.... Like Lieutenant-Colonel Alexander Vindman and Marie Yovanovitch, she is both an immigrant American and an expert on the former Soviet Union. None of these witnesses took democracy for granted because they had witnessed its grim alternative in post-Soviet kleptocracies. As experts, they were a threat in the administration, and they remain so outside of it.... The Trump strategy [has become] to flip the script and investigate the investigators.... The witnesses to crimes, not the perpetrators, are the true guilty parties.... Impeachment hearings threaten Mr. Trump because they happen in an environment he cannot control, where a neutral arbiter can speak without media interlocutors. Fiona Hill debunked Mr. Trump's fictions and followed federal law. That she did so at a time where following federal law renders you a subversive in the eyes of the President should unnerve everyone." --s
Jonathan Swan of Axios: "Many were perplexed and outraged when, right after clashing with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan in a heated Oval Office meeting on Nov. 13, Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham hurried back to the Senate floor and ... blocked a resolution that would have formally recognized Turkey's genocide of the Armenian people.... As Graham was leaving the Oval Office, senior White House staff asked him to return to the Senate and block the Armenian genocide resolution -- a measure that would have infuriated Erdoğan. Graham confirmed this in a phone interview on Saturday.... Asked whether he felt uncomfortable blocking the Armenian genocide resolution, Graham replied: 'Yeah. Because I like Bob [Menendez]. He's been working on this for years, but I did think with the president of Turkey in town that was probably more than the market would bear.... I'm not going to object next time,' Graham added. The "next time" happened last week. Menendez and his Republican Senate colleague Ted Cruz introduced the Armenian genocide resolution again. This time, the White House asked another Republican Senate ally, David Perdue, to block it." And he did.
Presidential Race 2020
Emma Newburger & Brian Schwartz of CNBC: Former New York City Mayor Mike Bloomberg entered the 2020 presidential race on Sunday following weeks of speculation about whether he would join the crowded Democratic primary. [A] television ad touts Bloomberg's record as mayor and promises 'to rebuild the country and restore faith in the dream that defines us: where the wealthy will pay more in taxes and the middle class get their fair share; everyone without health insurance can get it and everyone who likes theirs, keep it; where jobs won't just help you get by but get ahead.... And on all those things, Mike Bloomberg intends to make good,' the ad said. The new ad is part of his $31 million television ad buy." (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~
~~~ Update. The New York Times story is here. (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~
~~~ Michael Calderone of Politico: "Bloomberg News will report on Michael Bloomberg's 2020 presidential campaign, though will not investigate the candidate or his Democratic rivals, the company's top editor told staff on Sunday. 'We will write about virtually all aspects of this presidential contest in much the same way as we have done so far,' editor-in-chief John Micklethwait told staff in a Sunday memo. 'We will describe who is winning and who is losing. We will look at policies and their consequences. We will carry polls, we will interview candidates and we will track their campaigns, including Mike's.' Micklethwait also said that some of the news organization's opinion and editorial writers would take a leave to join the campaign."
David Gura of NBC News: "Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg is back home and resting after being hospitalized on Friday. Ginsburg, 86, has been released after being admitted with chills and a fever, a spokesperson for the Supreme Court said on Sunday." (Also linked yesterday.)
Allison Sommer of Haaretz: "The rise and catastrophic downfall of WeWork founder and former CEO Adam Neumann has been chronicled in gleeful detail across the international financial press in the wake of his company's ill-fated attempt at a public offering -- which resulted in disastrous revelations about the company's mismanagement, its devaluation and, ultimately, Neumann's resignation. But a new Vanity Fair article by Gabriel Sherman..., asserts that Neumann's 'millennial entitlement gone insane' and guru-like 'egomaniacal glamour' extended beyond the business world and into the world of Middle East diplomacy." ~~~
~~~ Gabriel Sherman of Vanity Fair: "WeWork [Israeli] cofounder Adam Neumann ... [has a] habit of making grandiose pronouncements like wanting to be elected president of the world, live forever, and become humanity's first trillionaire.... The company's valuation put Neumann's net worth at $4.1 billion -- and his spending more than kept pace.... Last summer, some WeWork executives were shocked to discover Neumann was working on Jared Kushner's Mideast peace effort ... Neumann told colleagues that he was saving the women of Saudi Arabia by working with Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman to offer women coding classes, according to a source. In another meeting, Neumann said three people were going to save the world: bin Salman, Jared Kushner, and Neumann." --s
Way Beyond the Beltway
Hong Kong. Shibani Mahtani, et al., of the Washington Post: "Voters took to the polls in record numbers to cast ballots in the only fully democratic election in the Chinese territory, an early sign that they wanted to send a strong message to their government and to the Communist Party in Beijing. Early results compiled by the South China Morning Post showed pro-democracy parties winning 278 of the first 344 seats to be declared, pro-Beijing parties taking 42, and independents 24. Many prominent figures in the protest movement won; many leading pro-establishment figures were unseated. Pro-democrats look to be able to secure 12 of 18 district councils available in Hong Kong -- before this vote, they did not have a majority in any." An AP story is here. ~~~
~~~ Update. Jeffie Lam, et al., of the South China Morning Post: "The final election results were confirmed at 1pm on Monday when the vote count was completed.... Among the 452 seats up for grabs, the pan-democrats were victorious in 347, the independents -- many of them pro-democracy -- won 45, while the pro-establishment camp had to make do with 60. The pro-democracy camp now has control of 17 out of 18 district councils."
U.K. Robert Booth of the Guardian: “Prince Andrew is to withdraw from scores of charities in a move that appeared designed to protect the monarchy from further humiliation over his association with Jeffrey Epstein. Buckingham Palace confirmed on Sunday that the Duke of York is 'standing back from all his patronages' but indicated he still hopes to return to a public role at some point by saying the move was only temporary." (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~
~~~ No Birthday Bash for Andy. Nick Enoch of the Daily Mail: "The Queen has scrapped plans to host a party for Prince Andrew to mark his 60th birthday in February. Instead, the monarch is said to be arranging a small family dinner for the Duke, according to The Sunday Times. His birthday is on February 19." (Also linked yesterday.)
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Reader Comments (16)
IMHO, Spencer's resignation letter sounds like a yuge "Fuck you" to the Traitor-in-Chief.
@unwashed: Yeah, that's the way I read it. Spencer appears to have used Jim Mattis's resignation letter as a model. There are polite ways to say, "Fuck you," aren't there? Alas, since Trump can't read, he probably doesn't even know it.
My suggestion to the next person forced to resign is to make an acrostic of the letters F U C K Y O & U, each beginning the first word of each paragraph down the page. And put those letters in bold. It's been done. In August 2017, "Daniel Kammen, formerly the science envoy at the State Department, resigned in a letter that contained the acrostic 'IMPEACH.'” In the same month, "members of the President’s Committee on the Arts and Humanities spelled out 'RESIST' with the first letter of each paragraph in their joint resignation letter." More famously, and unrelated to Trump in this case, was "Arnold Schwarzenegger’s 2009 veto message, believed to be directed at an assemblyman with whom he’d sparred. The first line of each sentence in the body of then-Governor Schwarzenegger’s veto letter spelled out 'FUCK YOU.'”
Finally got to Saturday's Dowd. Nicely catty per usual, with the addition of a vocabulary lesson which raised this question for me:
Since the words Dowd used to describle the Pretender were words I had either never encountered or that possessed for me only the vaguest familiarity, was it the Pretender's rise made it necessary to create them? Or have they been lurking for decades in the bowels of the OED just waiting for their day in the sun?
"Case in point (Dowd says): A few weeks ago, someone signed me up for A.Word.A.Day email from Wordsmith.org. Soon I began to detect a pattern.
Friday’s word was vulgarian, following close after bareknuckle. Others included rodomont (a vain boaster), grobian (a buffoonish person) and Sinon (one who misleads and betrays). Also chirocracy (a government that rules with a heavy hand) and froward (difficult to deal with or contrary)."
As I used to tell my students, you can always learn something, even from the most ignorant.
.......As with this vocabulary lesson, courtesy of the Pretender.
I'm not sure if this will work because my local paper, The Lakeville Journal, is usually pay-walled.
This is a piece from last week's issue about Amb. Marie Yovanovitch of her time growing up nearby in Kent, CT. She went to the town's public grammar school, but for high school she went to the private prep school, Kent School, where her parents taught languages. Since Kent is one of the seven towns that comprise our regional high school, had she not gone to Kent she would have been one of my wife's classmates.
Sad to read that Amb. Y. had to return between her closed and open testimonies to make funeral arrangements for her mother, Nadia, who died at age 91.
Tried it. The link won't work until you sign up for a 30-day free subscription. Probably not worth it unless you also want to read about Henry Kissinger's book signing (he lives in Kent) or who got cited for "failure to drive right".
Fatty and the Killers
Trump saves the day! A HEE-Roe!
A knee-slapper of Olympian proportions, Fatty's declaration (oops, I mean bald-faced lie) that he single-handedly saved the lives of tens of thousands of Hong Kong residents from a million or so bloodthirsty savages positioned by Xi Jinping at the gates of the city ready to storm in and wreak havoc.
First, the notion that the murderous intentions of Xi could be short-circuited by a phone call from Trump is about as ludicrous as the idea of Trump agreeing to testify at his own impeachment proceedings in the House. Sure, Fatty, that's gonna happen. As Wayne Campbell might say. Yeah, and monkeys might fly out of my butt."
Second, and this is the truly appalling part. On the one hand Trump presents a situation in which Xi's murderous intentions were clearly threatening the lives of a multitude of Hong Kong citizens, but on the other, he touts him as a good guy and a great buddy. My pal the psycho killer?
But Trump's love affair with murderous tyrants is epidemic. He loves him some sociopathic killers. His long-running romancing of former KGB psychopath and current Russian dictator and psychopath Vladimir Putin is the stuff of nightmares.
Last week I caught Terry Gross' interview with investigative journalist Heidi Blake about her new book "From Russia With Blood", a truly disturbing analysis of the many extra-judicial murders instigated by Trump handler Putin, murders greenlighted by the Russian strongman to take out critics and anyone who pisses him off enough. Very likely the stuff of many Fatty wet dreams, the ability to cavalierly murder those who displease his royal highness and get away with it. Just like Daddy Vlad.
And despite indisputable evidence of Putin's bad intent toward America and prior bad acts, Trump rallies to his banner whenever he is ordered to do so. At this point it's not so much that's he's responding to orders as it is a response marinated in equal measures love for Putin and fear of whatever dirt he holds over the matted orange dome.
Thus, in order to indulge his fantasies of murdering enemies, Trump demonstrates his approval of extra-judicial homicide by pardoning war criminals and then axing any who dare to question his love affair with cruelty, barbarism, and brutality.
Regarding the Spencer firing.
The Pretender madly projecting away, habitually gives permission for everyone to behave the way he does or wishes he could were there no social or political restraints in place. And, of course, he's doing all he can to trash those restraints as well.
So what's the effect of his pardoning of war criminals? Two thoughts occur. One, he's pardoning himself, first and always. Second, he's painting the entire military service with the same dark color. Criminal behavior in the military is OK. Nothing is out of bounds, no more there than in the White House.
So againt he raises the question and the challenge. Will the nation tolerate his assault on standards and morality in the White House? And will the military tolerate it within their own ranks?
Spencer didn't. But what of the other officers, and more critically, the rank and file?
Following up (albeit tangentially) on Ken’s question about how much we as a nation are willing to tolerate in terms of bad, very bad, and downright treasonous acts in the part of the Orange Menace, actions initiated in our name and (mostly) with our money, I’m of a mind that Nancy (The Trump Nut Crusher) Pelosi should be in no great hurry to impeach and impale the criminal now holed up—with Russian help—in the White House.
I’d wait to see if a gander at those tax returns might be in the offing. They might yield a cornucopia of evil deeds and illegal schemes and high crimes. This guy is King Midas in reverse, as the song goes, and as Marie points out, he is a political and moral Medusa, turning everyone to stone who looks at him and whatever moral compass they might possess into a useless piece of dried dung.
Pretty much everything he does has the taint of illegality and self dealing. There’s a lot more to uncover besides the Ukraine quid pro quo scandal and its subsequent outflow of lies and misdirection.
I’d wait to see what other stones can be overturned. Little Trumpy lizards abound in stinking holes under those rocks.
Given Trump's* behavior with Intelligence, State, etc., this crude interference with the normal authority of the military looks a lot like he is trying to make the whole military swear fealty to only him - as well as trying to disrupt rules of conduct within the system.
What kind of madman rejoices in deeds of chaos like this?
Who told him this would be a great idea? He certainly does not have the brains to think this up.
I'm in no hurry either, Akhilleus.
And I see Bea beat me to it:
Following up on myself from yesterday's screed on using Natural Law as an excuse for stupidity and heinous acts, I see doofus Rick Perry has now declared that the Pretender's ascension was ordained by God.
https://www.cnn.com/2019/11/25/politics/rick-perry-donald-trump-god/index.html
I thought Republicans, Perry among them, did it.
Nothing handier than to have a god around to blame for your own misdeeds.
More likely, the Devil made him do it.
I am so tired of this nonsense.
@Ken Winkes: Ancient Greek Gnostics believed the Hebrew god was a demiurge, an incompetent (or even evil) demigod who controlled the material world & didn't do a very good job of it, or as Woody Allen called the Hebrew god, "an underachiever."
As Marie notes, the Lord moves in mysterious ways. This is especially true concerning the choice of the Orange Fat Man. I'd guess it's less a mystery and more a four day bender.
What Would Zeno Say?
Wait a sec. I'm confused. I read that Rick (Like my glasses?) Perry sez that god ordained that Fatty be king, er, president*, er, whatever. And then in order to prove, um, something, he goes on to state that god put Obama on the throne as well.
Ohhhhh...kaaaaay...
So lemme see how that one works out.
God makes Trump king, therefore we are all supposed to bow down and worship before him, right? But if god put Obama in the White House, who is McTurtle to declare that he was gonna deep six god's choice? Who are all those racist Foxbots who ripped him day and night for eight years and three or four times on Sunday before church? And who are all those Evangelicals who dearly wished for some terrible fate to befall that horrible nee-groe after god chose him to be president?
They weren't down with god's decision? Or maybe they said "The old man is nuts. He can't be serious making some uppity darkie the president, right?" Except now that their guy is in, it's all jake, because god. Is that right?
A new day, a new paradox from the heart of the confederacy. These people are starting to make Zeno look like a piker. The tortoise, the arrow, that stadium idea. Hmmph. How 'bout "god picked Trump"?
Now there's a paradox.
Akhilleus,
Ah, don't confuse the poor guy with glasses...
Not nice at all.
Maybe we're missing the point.
Maybe god is REALLY mad at the US.
He's been sending some pretty bad weather into the bible belt as well as California.
DiJiT may just be our portion of locusts, flies, frogs, drought, pestilence and death of firstborns. I mean, the Old Testament god was pretty darn mean ... something as bad as DiJiT is hard to imagine, but here we are.
And what did we do to make him so angry? Maybe just that we got so stupid it embarasses the creator.
This whole war criminals are great saga has reminded me that earlier this year we heard reports of Trump telling border patrol troops to keep immigrants out of the US and he would pardon them if they got into trouble. This is a truly terrifying message to be sending to people who have not shown a lot of humanity toward people under their care.